Kmart is closing 64 stores and firing thousands of employees

Sears Holdings, which owns Sears and Kmart, informed Kmart employees of the closures on Friday, according to local news reports and employees who spoke to Business Insider.

The stores that are closing will begin liquidation sales on September 22, and close by mid December, employees said.

Sears did not respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

Separately on Friday, Seritage Growth Properties, a real-estate-investment trust that owns 235 Sears and Kmart stores, revealed in a filing that Sears had decided to terminate leases on 17 stores, meaning it would close those stores.

Macy's Inc. signage is displayed at a department store in New York, U.S., on Monday, Feb. 22, 2016. Macy's Inc., the largest U.S. department-store company, is scheduled to report fourth-quarter 2015 earnings before the opening of U.S. financial markets on February 23. Photographer: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg via Getty Images

UNITED STATES - JUNE 09: Customers enter the Dillards department store at Parkdale Mall, in Beaumont, Texas, Wednesday morning, June 9, 2004. A judge declared a mistrial in a lawsuit brought against Dillard's Inc. by 17 black shoppers in Texas who claimed that security guards at the department store chain harassed them because of their race. (Photo by Scott Eslinger/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

MIAMI, FL - APRIL 19: A Nordstrom sign is seen outside a store on April 19, 2016 in Miami, Florida. Nordstrom on Monday said in a cost-cutting measure they are expecting to lay off 350 to 400 people. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

The sign outside the Kmart store is seen in Broomfield, Colorado November 19, 2009. Sears Holdings Corp posted a narrower-than-expected quarterly loss November 19, 2009, helped by the first increase in same-store sales at its Kmart unit in four years. REUTERS/Rick Wilking (UNITED STATES BUSINESS)

Up Next

See Gallery

Discover More Like This

HIDE CAPTION

SHOW CAPTION

of

SEE ALL

BACK TO SLIDE

According to RBC Capital Markets analysts, all 17 closures are Kmart stores and they will close by January.